Rochester Autumn F1 Duathlon

Not going to put out a full race report on this one, but what a crazy race! Temperature of 43 degrees, driving rains and wind made for a crazy day. 11 DNF’s including several bike crashes and injuries made for chaos. Despite this, I was able to place 6th of 90 something in what is always a very competitive F1 race (there was also a super sprint race that had over 100 people).

Like last fall, the format was 2 mile run, 10 mile bike, 2 mile run, 10 mile bike, 2 mile run. The run is on a mix of trail, grass, and road while the bike is a challenging course with constant rolling hills that really grind you down if you’re not careful. Also worth noting was that this year much of the run course was solid mud/water and was very slippery in places, making fast run splits impossible. Despite the slow run/bike conditions, I was significantly faster than last year, which was nice to see. Here is the comparison:

2010 –> 2011:

Run 1: —— 13:20 –> 13:55

T1: ———- 0:28 –> 0:25

Bike 1: —— 31:45 –> 29:16

T2: ———- 0:32 –> 0:30

Run 2: —— 14:53 –> 14:22

T3: ———- 0:29 –> 0:32

Bike 2: —— 33:11 –> 29:35

T4: ———- 0:30 –> 0:25

Run 3: —— 15:56 –> 14:33

total: ——– 1:51:02 –> 1:43:44

Place: ——- 24/108 –> 6/95

***Same winner as last year. His overall time was ~4 minutes slower than last year (as were many others). Speaks to how bad the conditions were this year, for what it is worth***

Also worth noting, I did not wear a watch for the trail run, and only data point on the bike was heart rate. I think this contributed to my fairly even splits. Especially considering how little I’ve run since the collarbone incident in June, I’m very happy with the result! 6 months + until the next duathlon. Hopefully next year overall podiums will become the norm. cheers!